TCOTC was well represented at this year’s North American Dog Agility Council (NADAC) Championships, held October 5-8 at the Champions Center Arena in Springfield Ohio. Wayne Carlson and his Papillon ‘Paris’ earned 1st place in the Elite Veteran Dog Miniature Division and Gina Pizzo (one of TCOTC’s Agility Instructors) and her Border Collie ‘Shay’ took 2nd place in the Elite Veteran Handler Large Dog Division.
During the first three days of the Championships, each dog/handler team competes in six Qualifying runs. The results of those six runs are added together and the teams with the highest cumulative scores are invited to participate in the Finals round on Sunday. In their six Qualifying runs, Wayne and Paris placed 1st three times and 2nd three times, earning the top seed in their Division going into the Finals, while Gina and Shay placed 2nd four times and 8th twice, earning the number 2 seed in their Division.
To determine the overall winners, each team’s score from their Finals run is added to the scores from their six Qualifying runs. Only the top three highest cumulative scoring teams in each Division win an award and the competition is stiff. While each run is worth a maximum of 150 points (1050 points over all seven runs), Gina and Shay missed 1st place in their Division by less than 37 points and Wayne and Paris edged out the 2nd place team in theirs by only 0.85 points!
Two other TCOTC members also competed at this year’s NADAC Championships, Rhonda Noetzelman and her Border Collie ‘Lazlo’ and Jim Nally (another TCOTC Agility Instructor) and his Border Collie ‘Keen’. While neither team made it to the Finals, Rhonda and Lazlo did earn four ribbons during their Qualifying rounds (placing 1st, 5th, 7th and 8th) and both teams competed in the Challenger Round, open to all of the teams that didn’t qualify for Finals. Unlike Finals, where the Final round score is added to previous six scores, the Challenger round is “winner take all” format with only the top scoring dog in each size receiving an award. Jim and Keen won the award in the Large Dog group, which included 50 teams.
Gina/Shay, Rhonda/Lazlo, and Jim/Keen also competed in the Championships Team event, under the name “Minnesota Madness”. Teams run a separate, nested course, with each team member running a different part of the course in kind of a relay race. The score earned on the Team course is added to the cumulative totals of each team member’s Qualifying runs to determine the overall Team champion. Unfortunately, Minnesota Madness followed in the footsteps of other recent Minnesota teams (think Vikings, Twins, Wolves, etc.) and came up a bit short of winning the Team title.
Congratulations to our TCOTC members on their success at this year’s NADAC Championships!
Pictured above: Gina Pizzo and Shay, Wayne Carlson and Paris, Rhonda Noetzelman and Lazlo, and Jim Nally and Keen.
(Note: Next year’s NADAC Championships are scheduled for September 22-25 in Gillette, WY. More info about NADAC, local NADAC trials, and next year’s Championships [including how to qualify for them] is available at www.nadac.com.)